I was driving my wife home from the emergency room this afternoon after having her checked out following liver biopsy complications from last week. We were traveling at approximately 50 MPH when the driver of a late model jeep made a left turn from about 25-35 yards in front of us. I hit the brakes and the jeep just got closer and closer. I don't know how many feet separated us as the side of the jeep became larger and larger. At the last second I swerved left to avoid a head-on impact. God was definitely on our side as I missed the right rear of the jeep by mere inches. My wife credited it with my quick reflexes, but when you take into account that I'm closing in on 74 years of age and my right foot is totally paralyzed from the ankle down from a service connected injury there had to be something else involved. I've seen all the commercials on TV praising anti-collision systems and had checked out the our 2016 Toyota Avalon Limited safety features to see if in fact it had it. The data said yes and I kept asking myself if the system was operating properly and worked. Today's experience has made me a true believer in the system. There is no way I could have reacted that quickly without it. Thank you Toyota for saving our lives today!

I am glad you are okay, but in reading your account it was not clear to me as to how he Anti collision system was involved. Can you clarify?

I expect it started braking before he did.

ZSMICHAEL: Think of the system as a radar sensor beam designed to detect specific objects crossing your path of movement which automatically activates the braking system of your vehicle. As for the nitty gritty aspects of the system, those techies on SF will have to fill in the technical specifics.
As SIGJACKET stated, the system reacted before I could.

Thanks for filling in the details. Nice to see technology is helping save lives.

Glad to hear it, and thanks for the report. I will definitely remember it for the next time someone makes an idiotic comment about we shouldn’t seek “hardware solutions to what are software problems.”

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
Glad to hear it, and thanks for the report. I will definitely remember it for the next time someone makes an idiotic comment about we shouldn’t seek “hardware solutions to what are software problems.”

When you consider root cause contributing factors that are identified to have directly contributed to errors or adverse events, "software problems" are often front and center. The knee jerk reaction is to call for "more training", "better training", or "pay closer attention", which is something I always see being parroted around in the firearms community when it comes to NDs or other safety issues. The reality is that "more better training" is a one of the weakest root cause analysis recommendations when it comes to developing lasting strategies to prevent repeat errors or adverse events. Nobody wants to admit that the design of their favorite striker pistol may in fact inherently contribute to a greater likelihood of leading to a safety issue, when all other things are equal. This is why many newer striker fired pistols require the user to fully retract the slide in order to actuate a takedown lever *before* pulling the trigger to release the striker, instead of the other way around, or not require a trigger pull at all.

You can force someone to attend training session after training session but if you really want to make sure a fatigued, distracted brain attached to an equally fatigued, distracted human doesn't make an error or do something stupid, the most reliable solution is often a hardware solution or hard stop that reduces the likelihood of an error or at least mitigates it.

quote:

Originally posted by sakata8242:
You can force someone to attend training session after training session but if you really want to make sure a fatigued, distracted brain attached to an equally fatigued, distracted human doesn't make an error or do something stupid, the most reliable solution is often a hardware solution or hard stop that reduces the likelihood of an error or at least mitigates it.

Hallelujah, brother!

That’s the best short discussion of a subject that many people aggressively refuse to think about, much less acknowledge, that I’ve ever read.

The progress of the human species has been the history of finding hardware solutions to our problems and life requirements. One would think that gun owners of all people would recognize that fact, but they seem to be the most resistant to that obvious truth and must learn the same lessons over and over.

I love the name- TCAS. Like the aviation TCAS.

Most people do not apply maximum braking pressure in an emergency stop, or if they do, they do not apply it early enough.

The new collision avoidance systems in cars not only start braking for you earlier, but more critically, it applies maximum brake force at the earliest opportunity.

quote:

Originally posted by Aeteocles:
Most people do not apply maximum braking pressure in an emergency stop, or if they do, they do not apply it early enough.

The new collision avoidance systems in cars not only start braking for you earlier, but more critically, it applies maximum brake force at the earliest opportunity.

And in a Cadillac CTS it's incredibly annoying - rental car I had, required a couple quick slow downs in dense traffic. Apparently the quickness of my brake application made the system think I needed full application, resulting in unexpected and unnecessary brake force.

I'd rather have full control of my vehicle so that I can do my best to avoid the obstacle in front of me and avoid being rear-ended at the same time.

Dunno anything about the TCAS, but our 2011 Tacoma came with ABS.

A really good driver in tune with his car can get maximum braking effort (or pretty darned close) out his vehicle without locking any wheels up. On a vehicle with ABS, any idiot can stand on the breaks and get maximum effort without locking wheels up.

I could imagine that if the TCAS includes ABS, it can apply a whole lot of brakes without compromising the ability to maneuver.

Of course, that isn't going to do anything for the guy traveling too close behind you. Ooopsie.

Yes--the Toyota Safety sense does its job. New for me on my Toyota. At first, I thought it wasn't working until I tried to "anticipate" an automatic gate with a pressure plate. The system applied the brakes cuz it sensed the gate in my path. Safety wins.

I don't like the idea of a computer being able to control the braking of a vehicle.

I would worry about the brakes being applied unexpectedly. Computer glitch, bug splatter on the sensor, whatever.

I don't own a car with this technology, so admittedly I'm not well-versed on the subject.

All I know is I'm glad you and your wife are safe and that's a great thing!

quote:

I would worry about the brakes being applied unexpectedly.

I have had this happen to me twice in my better half's Mazda CX-9. It didn't agree with the way I was driving, and activated the brakes when I didn't want to brake.

quote:

Originally posted by mod29:
I don't like the idea of a computer being able to control the braking of a vehicle.

I would worry about the brakes being applied unexpectedly. Computer glitch, bug splatter on the sensor, whatever.

I don't own a car with this technology, so admittedly I'm not well-versed on the subject.

While driving with the radar cruise-control on, both my parents' cars will (annoyingly) fail to distinguish between a car that's slowing down to make a turn vs a car that's slowing down to stop, and they'll auto-brake the same in both situations (and they both allow the driver to override the braking by using the gas pedal). Other than that sort of thing, I've not heard of any "bugs" in auto-braking systems. Of course, that doesn't prove anything... just sharing my experiences with an implementation of the technology.

quote:

Originally posted by a1abdj:

quote:

I would worry about the brakes being applied unexpectedly.

I have had this happen to me twice in my better half's Mazda CX-9. It didn't agree with the way I was driving, and activated the brakes when I didn't want to brake.

Apparently I spoke too soon

On that new Honda CR-V I talked about last week, it also has all this new technology and it was explained to me that it has a radar detector in the grill someplace that gauges the speed of vehicles in front of you and makes decisions based on info that it provides to the computer. It also has a camera in front of the rear view mirror that monitors the road ahead and highway markers and that info is also sent to the computer.

Hasn't saved my life or anything yet but I am so far pretty impressed with it all.